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If the BlackBerry Z10 smartphone was a bold statement, a declaration that BlackBerry and its new operating system were ready to quit messing around and really compete against modern phones, the Q10 is the company's love letter to its most loyal customers. The Z10 and its big, rectangular touchscreen look like the post-iPhone devices that we've gotten used to; the Q10, with its hardware keyboard and square screen, looks much like the BlackBerrys of a decade ago.

But the Q10 isn't some half-measure like the BlackBerry Bold or Curve, stopgap hardware running an operating system in desperate need of an overhaul. It's a proper BlackBerry 10 handset, running the same OS and applications as its taller, slimmer cousin. So what can it do that the Z10 doesn't, and vice versa? How do the physical keyboard and smaller screen change the BlackBerry 10 experience? And does the Q10 strike a satisfying balance between old and new, or does it simply feel outdated?

Power adapter, case, headphones, extra battery with charging cradle (retail phones may or may not come with all accessories)

If you're familiar with the BlackBerry Bold or BlackBerry Curve, the BlackBerry Q10 will seem familiar. It looks like a Bold and the Z10 had a baby, with the Z10 having mostly recessive genes. The Q10 is a bit shorter and a bit thicker than most all-touchscreen phones, and its front face is split by its 3.1-inch, 720×720 touchscreen and 35-key backlit keyboard.

We'll be spending most of this review with the keyboard and screen rather than BlackBerry 10 itself, which is substantially the same as it was when we originally reviewed it, but BlackBerry 10.1 does make using the Q10 subtly different. You'll find that some UI elements that were white by default on the Z10 are now black by default, a move apparently made to conserve battery life. PIN-to-PIN messaging, which allows you to send messages to a particular BlackBerry handset, is also available in the BlackBerry Hub, and an HDR shooting mode (which we'll revisit later) has been added to the camera app. All of these changes (among others) will make it to the Z10 when its BlackBerry 10.1 update is out, but depending on when the Q10 is available they might be exclusive to it for a while.

Returning to the Q10: it's very slightly heavier than the Z10 (0.31 pounds compared to 0.30) and is shorter but also wider and thicker (0.41 inches thick, compared to 0.35 inches). The result is a phone that feels smaller than most, and most people should be able to reach the entire keyboard and most of the screen with one thumb while holding the phone one-handed.

The Q10 (top) is a bit thicker than the Z10, but shares its button and port layout. The power button and headphone jack are on the top.

Andrew Cunningham

The micro USB and micro HDMI ports on the phone's left side.

Andrew Cunningham

The volume rocker and play/pause/voice control button on the right.

Andrew Cunningham

The phone's single speaker is on the bottom.

Andrew Cunningham

The rounded, smooth back of the Q10 (right) compared to the pitted, rubbery back of the Z10.

Andrew Cunningham

The back of the phone slides off to reveal the battery, SIM, and micro SD card slot.

Andrew Cunningham

Our review unit came with a case, a charger, a headset, a spare battery pack and charger, and some documentation.

Andrew Cunningham

The back of the phone is slightly rounded and uses a smooth (but still somewhat grippy) plastic or carbon fiber that slides down to reveal the battery, SIM slot, and micro SD slot. It's different from the pitted, rubbery, peel-off back of the Z10, but the effect is much the same: it's easy to grip and less likely to slide around in your hand than something made of glass (the Nexus 4) or smooth slippery plastic (most Samsung phones).

The port and button layout roughly matches that of the Z10: a power button and headphone jack are on the top of the phone, the micro-USB and micro-HDMI ports are on the left, a single (serviceable but tinny) speaker is on the bottom, and the volume rocker and play/pause/voice control button are on the right side. Overall, it's an extremely solid-feeling phone, and there's no undue flexing or creaking. It looks and feels like a premium product.

The keyboard you’ve been waiting for

Most BlackBerry Q10 buyers will be getting the phone for its 35-key physical keyboard, which a small (if vocal) minority continue to prefer over touch-based keyboards. This keyboard is designed to be thumb-friendly—the keys on the left and right sides of the keyboard are sloped slightly differently to be more comfortable to your left and right thumbs. The keys are satisfying and clicky and their backlight is nice and even. They're very firm as well.

The keys are identical to those on phones like the Bold and the Curve, but the layout is slightly different. The rows of keys on these older phones were arranged in a downward arc, but the rows on the Q10 are straight; BlackBerry says that the "frets" between the rows have been made slightly thicker to help avoid missed key presses. I couldn't type quite as quickly on the physical keyboard as I can on a touch keyboard, but even compared to the Z10's generally excellent touch keyboard, I made fewer typing errors on the Q10.

Enlarge/ The Z10's software keyboard actually obscures a bit more of the screen area than the Q10's, but the software keyboard can be dismissed to regain that screen space.

Andrew Cunningham

Accuracy isn't the only thing to consider when comparing a touch keyboard to a physical one, though; physical keyboards lack some of the versatility of BlackBerry 10's soft keyboard. Gone is the ability to quickly swipe through the standard, numerical, and symbol keyboards; gone is the handy swipe-to-complete predictive text; and gone is the ability to change characters on the keyboard if you're typing in a different language (or if you prefer a non-QWERTY layout). Some actions are the same on both keyboards (holding down a key for a second to make a capital letter, holding it down for longer to bring up a list of extended characters), but the similarities end there.

Enlarge/ Some keyboard shortcuts are labeled in BlackBerry 10's menus.

To make up for some of the missing features, the Q10 supports some keyboard shortcuts. Starting to type from the home screen will automatically invoke the phone's search feature, so you can type things like "BBM Matt" or "SMS Flo" to quickly and easily begin doing those things. You can press T to go to the top of a page or document you're scrolling in, B to go to the bottom, or the spacebar to scroll down the page more gradually. There is also a small truckload of application-specific shortcuts, the full list of which we've uploaded in PDF form for your perusal. As with any keyboard shortcuts, they take some time to feel natural, but once they do it's difficult to live without them.

The Q10 comes with an alternate predictive typing mechanism, which is enabled from the settings panel. Begin typing and a selection of up to three words (or, occasionally, punctuation marks) will appear above the keyboard, and you can tap one to select it. This feature is similar to the way the stock Jelly Bean keyboard operates, among others. The phone will also offer you some suggested words as you type, making it theoretically possible to string entire sentences together without tapping the keyboard more than a few times. As in the Z10's software keyboard, the predictive typing is designed to become more accurate as time passes.

One thing the keyboard doesn't really change is BB10's reliance on its many touchscreen gestures—swipe up to return to the home screen, swipe to the right to get to the message-aggregating BlackBerry Hub, swipe to the left to get to your iOS-and-Android-like grid of application icons, and so on. You'll need the touchscreen for all of this, as well as things like text selection. The various scroll wheels and nubs used by BlackBerrys past are gone—and they're not likely to return.

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Andrew Cunningham
Andrew wrote and edited tech news and reviews at Ars Technica from 2012 to 2017, where he still occasionally freelances; he is currently a lead editor at Wirecutter. He also records a weekly book podcast called Overdue. Twitter@AndrewWrites